How to Reduce the Appearance of Pores

Everyone has pores.

Sometimes our pores can appear enlarged and feel like they are taking over our face!

Note: you CANNOT reduce the size of your pores (*sigh*), they are genetic BUT we can reduce the appearance of them!

We need to know what a pore is exactly before we can understand how to minimise it. Pores are the small openings all over your skin that release oil, sweat and are also connected to your hair follicles.

There are two types of pores:

First is your oil pores.

These are the pores that can appear enlarged as the oil gland in the pore can overreact and cause blackhead, whiteheads, and acne.

This type of pore is also more noticeable as we age because it is already larger, when we age and lose the elasticity in our skin, the pore will stretch appearing larger again. We should not be shrinking our pores too much as they have a very important job. Pores are responsible for lubricating the skin. Our natural oil comes through these pores to help keep our skin moisturized and healthy.

The second type is your sweat pore.

These are very tiny and hard to see with the naked eye. Excessive sweating is caused when these pores overreact.

If your oil pores look enlarged it could be due to being stretched by dead skin and dirt build up. This happens when the pore gets clogged not allowing the oil to escape and having to mix with the impurities creating a spot or blackhead. Ultimately filling the pore causing it to be easily viewable. Luckily there are precautions we can take to help prevent our pores from being so viable and reduce the ones that already have.

Firstly, we need to be keeping our skin clean. Cleansing morning and night will help wash away any excess oils and dirt you may have encountered.

Next we need to be exfoliating. Using an exfoliate that is right for your skin type every few days will help make sure you are getting deep into the pores and clearing them out as well as clearing away dead skin, so they do not get clogged in your pores.

Using exfoliants with AHAs and BHAs can maximize your exfoliant as these will penetrate deeper into the pore for a better clear out. To help reduce the appearance in size we use clay masks. These masks help draw out impurities and help to shrink the skin around the pore causing them to appear smaller. We also need to be moisturising our skin no matter how oily you feel your skin is. Moisturising helps keep our skin balanced and can reduce the overproduction of your oil. You just need to be choosing the appropriate one for your skin type.

Top 6 tips for healthy pores:

1.  Never sleep in make-up – we want our skin to be clean for our nights rest for it to be able to function properly. Your skin does all its best work when we are sleeping like renewing cells and healing, if we have make-up left on clogging our skin, our cells will not be able to work properly, and our pores can get badly clogged and stretched.
2.  Drink plenty of water - for optimum skin health you want to stay hydrated as water can help remove toxins from your skin and improve the overall health and functions of the skin
3.  Always wear sunscreen - the sun can damage your pores causing them to not function properly and dry out your skin which can make your pores appear larger.
4.  Cleanse after a sweaty workout – sweating helps to push out impurities from our pores, which means we want to clean them off the skin as soon as possible so they do not return.
5.  Change your pillowcase often – your pillowcase can hold a lot of dead skin and oils from your skin and hair, therefore we want to change it often to so it does not affect our skin
6. Using a Retinol product – Retinol is great for resurfacing the skin ensuring it’s healthy and clear. Retinol helps slough away the dead skin cells and impurities reducing the pores visibility. NB: Retinol should be used a sparingly, especially at first. If you are unsure, feel free to get in touch.

Are you unsure of which products are best for you and your skin type?

Book in your free consultation today 01179500500

Love Beautology x

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